Waning Crescent Moon
Waning Crescent MoonImage credit: NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio.(large image)

Waning Crescent in Sagittarius

Waning Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 40% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 23 days old.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises after midnight to early morning and sets in the afternoon. It is visible in the early morning low to the east.

Moon phases on nearby dates

Slide horizontally to discover the moon phase on nearby dates.

Upcoming main moon phases

Main moon phases of the following lunar cycle.

Moon phase and lunation details

Moon in ♐ Sagittarius

Moon is leaving the last ∠4° of ♐ Sagittarius tropical zodiac sector and will enter ♑ Capricorn later.

1 day after Last Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the Last Quarter before 1 day on 2 March 2081 at 11:06.

Worm Moon after 21 days

Next Full Moon is the Worm Moon of March 2081 after 21 days on 25 March 2081 at 00:29.

Neap tide

There is low ocean tide on this date. Sun and Moon gravitational forces are not aligned, but meet at big angle, so their combined tidal force is weak.

Apparent angular diameter ∠1820"

Lunar disc appears visually 6.1% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1820" and ∠1935".

Lunation 1003 / 1956

The Moon is 23 days old and navigating from the second to the final part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 1003 of Meeus index or 1956 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.79 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 19 hours and 1 minute and it is 2 hours and 2 minutes longer than the upcoming lunation's length. The lengths of the following synodic months are going to decrease with the lunar orbit true anomaly getting closer to the value it has at the point of New Moon at perigee (∠0° or ∠360°).

Lunation length longer than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 6 hours and 16 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 47 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠177.5°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠177.5° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠202.2°.

Moon before apogee

8 days since point of perigee on 23 February 2081 at 06:18 in ♍ Virgo the lunar orbit is getting widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 4 days until the Moon reaches the point of next apogee on 8 March 2081 at 06:10 in ♒ Aquarius.

Distance to Moon 393 832 km

The Moon is 393 832 km (244 716 mi) away from Earth and getting further over the next 4 days until the point apogee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 406 362 km (252 502 mi).

Moon after descending node

6 days after descending node on 24 February 2081 at 20:03 in ♍ Virgo the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 7 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 10 March 2081 at 22:30 in ♓ Pisces.

Moon at southern standstill

At 19:02 the Moon is meeting its standstill point to reach South declination of ∠-28.668°. This is the year's southernmost lunar standstill of 2081. Over the upcoming 14 days the lunar orbit is going to tilt northward to face maximum declination of ∠28.673° at the point of next northern standstill in ♊ Gemini on 18 March 2081 at 10:34.

Draconic month

19 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♓ Pisces the Moon is navigating from the second to the final part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 7 days

In 7 days on 10 March 2081 at 15:16 in ♓ Pisces the Moon is going to be in a New Moon geocentric conjunction with the Sun and thus forming the next Sun-Moon-Earth syzygy alignment.

Lunar calendar

Sources and credits

Parts of this Lunar Calendar are based on Planetary Ephemeris Data Courtesy of Fred Espenak, www.Astropixels.com

Moon phase image credit to NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio, svs.gsfc.nasa.gov